


Exist to Die and Still Live On

by DragonThistle



Category: Eddsworld - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Emetophobia, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mind Break, Murder, No happy endings, Panic Attacks, Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey Bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 05:50:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15066548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonThistle/pseuds/DragonThistle
Summary: The first time he dies, it's easy. It's everything afterwards that's hard. And it's made even harder when the universe itself is working against him. How many times does he have to try...and how many times does he have to fail...





	Exist to Die and Still Live On

**Author's Note:**

> This is a dark fic that came from a dark place. Please read the tags. This was originally posted on water-hates-learning.tumblr.com

Matt’s choking and all he can do is put his face in his hands and wait. He can feel Matt’s hands, slippery with blood, pawing at the hem of his jeans, the gargling gasp as he tries to speak through the cut in his throat, the desperate whimpers of his dying friend.

“I’m sorry,” He says into his palms, unable to look, to cowardly to face what he’s done, “I’m sorry but I have to do this, I have to fix this! It went wrong! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” His face is hot and wet with tears but he still won’t look. It’s only when Matt’s pawing hands stop grasping for him that he glances between his fingers.

All is still.

There is a subtle and rhythmic  _tink-tink-tink_  from the kitchen where blood is still dripping into the sink.

He draws in a shaking breath and puts the knife to his own throat.

***********

 

Tom catches him breaking in through a carelessly unlocked window in the middle of the night.

They fight. And, of course, Tom’s drunk.

Tom’s drunk and Tord doesn’t mean to push him that hard. He doesn’t mean to but he does and Tom’s head crashes against the edge of the window.

The wet snap sounds like damp stick being ripped apart. Before he can take in the damage, before he has to look at the wrong angle Tom’s head is at, he flees down the hall. He’s messed up again and he’s learned the hard way that there’s only one thing he can do to set it right.

 

***********

 

“Stop it!” His voice cracks, breaks, choked by his tears, “Stop it, I don’t want to do this anymore! Just stop it! Please, just stop! sTOP STOP STOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOP!”

 

***********

When he dies for the first time, it’s an easy death.

He’s old and he’s the only one whose heart is still stubbornly kicking. Although by now, even that stubbornness is fading. He’s sitting quietly, facing the ocean, just taking it all in. He hasn’t seen them in decades, not since he left that day. Somewhere along the line, he just decided to never come back.

So he closes his eyes and lets out a sigh, a last breath, and lets go.

But when he opens his eyes again, something’s gone wrong.

 

***********

 

Tord keeps trying.

Again and again and again and again.

Reset.

Reset.

RESET.

_R E S E T_.

No matter what he does, no matter how it ends, he ends up in that hostel in Norway, cold and alone and screaming.

He always wakes up screaming.

 

***********

 

“The universe is fucking with me,” He says bitterly into coffee so black he can see his exhausted expression reflected back at him, “Or someone’s fucking with me. I…I’m stuck. I don’t know what to do.”

“Sssoooo you’re telling me that you’re stuck in some kind of time loop?” Edd looks skeptical but not dismissive.

“Yes,” Tord says tiredly. He appears well rested, fresh and ready for the day. But there is tired sickness to every line of his body and a defeated blankness behind his eyes.

“You don’t look very panicked about it,” Edd goes to take a drink of Cola and frowns into the empty can, “How many times have we had this conversation?”

“Many times,” Tord murmurs, watching his old friend rise from his chair and head over to the fridge, “I haven’t exactly been counting but…it’s been…a lot…”

Edd hums thoughtfully as he reaches into the fridge and pulls out another can, wedging his finger under the pull tab, “Well, maybe you just need to— _ghck_!”

His words are cut off by a wet gasp as the pull tab snaps and wedges itself in his throat. Blood sprays from Edd’s neck and paints the fridge red. He drops his can and falls to the floor, gasping and pawing at his neck.

Tord watches this happen with an almost bored look on his face. And it might have been boredom if not for the way his hands are shaking around his coffee mug.

When Edd stops twitching, Tord pushes his chair back and goes to retrieve the gun from the back of the cabinet in the sitting room. Then he has to go find Matt and Tom.

 

***********

 

“WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME!? WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THIS TO ME!? PLEASE, JUST STOP! I’D RATHER DIE THAN GO THROUGH THIS ANYMORE! I’D RATHER BE DEAD! I’D RATHER….I’d rather…I’d rather be dead…please…just let me die…”

 

***********

 

All the times he’s scraped his plans, all the times he’s changed his mind, all the times he’s turned his back on the Red Army, he’s failed in the worst ways possible.

All the times he’s followed his original intentions, all the times he’s gone back to get what he left behind, all those times he’s tried to get away without getting them involved, they’ve always caught him.

Every time they’ve caught him, he’s forced to kill them and then himself so he can start over.

He doesn’t want them to know. They can’t know. They can’t get involved.

But every time, the universe works against him.

 

***********

 

Except for the one time it doesn’t.

Except that it kind of does.

He’s tries.

Goddamn him, he tries.

He tries to sneak in, only to get caught by Tom.

He tries to drive them off and only succeeds in pushing Tom away.

He tries. He tries so damn hard.

He rips out his own heart and grinds it to dust under the heel of his own stupid robot because, goddamn him, he just wants this to  _end_.

It’s too late. Too late to recover this timeline, too late to save anyone.  He has to destroy this one and start over  _again_  and he can’t  _take it anymore_!

“But I thought we were…I thought we were friends…!”

“Ha,  _no_! What would I need friends for when I’ve got  _this_!? I’m unstoppable!” The words tear open his chest and taste like poison on his tongue. He nearly chokes on them. Not his words, not what he wanted to say! But it’s too late, they’re out there, and he all he can do is laugh in maniacal state of panic because,  _god_ , what did he do to deserve this? He just wants it to end, please, god, let it end.

“Hey! Sunshine-lollipops!”

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

“Take a seat!”

This timeline, too, has failed. He has no choice. He sees red, edges blurring through tears, breath choking in his chest because he’d been  _so close_. But of course Tom has to screw things up. Tom, always butting in where he doesn’t belong. Stupid, drunken, unhelpful, annoying, freak-faced Tom.

The blast from the rocket exploding makes the ground shudder.

Matt is screaming. Edd is howling. Tom’s gone under a pile of rubble.

Tord can’t breathe. He panics, sputters words out and flees. He’ll come back and kill the other two later and reset everything. He’ll start over and everything will be okay.

The harpoon tears through the cockpit—tears through his plans—and scores his side like cold fire. Tord chokes on a sob, struggling with the controls, struggling to set things right. Hell, if he could just crash this damn robot into his old friends then maybe they could all die and he could try again. Even if he wants out, even if he doesn’t want to do this anymore, anything’s better than ending like  _this_. Anything’s better than ending with their hatred and their scorn and their lost everything; no memories, no home, no nothing to their names and it’s  _his fault_.

Struggle all he wants, the cogs and gears and winding forces of the world turn against him. They’ve finally steered him onto the path they want and they’re not letting him go.

When Paul and Pat haul him from the crash site, he vomits hot blood and burning stomach acid onto the scorched grass. Chokes down his sobs because if this is how he has to live then, damn it all, he’s not letting his men see him break. Not completely. Not yet.

There will be time for breaking later.

 

***********

 

“Reset…” He whispers hoarsely into the shadows, barely audible over the beeping machines, nearly delirious from the drugs in his system, “Reset…please…j-just let me…one more time…reset…reset…”

 

***********

 

Red Leader is sick, they say.

Red Leader is crazy, they say.

Red Leader can’t die, they say.

Red Leader is dangerous, they say.

Red Leader wants three specific men dead.

And they say he will stop at nothing to kill them.

 

***********

 

The word “RESET” is painted in red beneath the symbol of the Red Army.

 

***********

 

There’s not much of Tord left, when they find him.

Whatever was there has been scratched out with panic and fever and desperation, with tears and screams and blood.

There is no Tord anymore.

Just Red Leader.

And Red Leader is insane.


End file.
